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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/27846530">Let Your Sins be of Omission</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/ghostwriterofthemachine/pseuds/ghostwriterofthemachine'>ghostwriterofthemachine</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Batman (Comics), Batman - All Media Types, Red Robin (Comics)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Asexual Character, Asexuality, Bad Sex, Character Study, Dissociation, Fairly Unresolved Ending, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, M/M, Misunderstanding of Consent, Tim Drake is a Mess, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms, implied child neglect</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-12-02</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-12-02</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-10 21:42:21</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,149</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/27846530</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/ghostwriterofthemachine/pseuds/ghostwriterofthemachine</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>“Did you <em>not want to have sex?”</em> Kon asks, his voice taking on a panicked pitch. </p><p>There are many ways Tim could answer that; <em>‘No, I never want to have sex.’ ‘Yes, but only to make you happy.’</em></p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Tim Drake/Kon-El | Conner Kent, Tim Drake/Other(s)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>22</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>276</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Let Your Sins be of Omission</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>This is a vent fic, and I am very aware it’s probably only useful to or wanted by me. But it exists, so I might as well share it. </p><p>Please be aware of the tags.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>Tim has a place where he can go, sometimes. Inside his head. He can float there, and be present and not-present, there and not-there, functioning in body but somewhere else in mind. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>He had picked up the skill when he was a little kid— or, at least, that’s when he first remembers doing it. It happens the first time because he is being yelled at. He hates being yelled at. It makes his blood rush and his throat tighten and it makes him feel unwelcome in his own body. So he just. Slips away from his body. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Tim goes to a little gray place where he’s being yelled at, he knows he is, but he doesn’t need to </span>
  <em>
    <span>think</span>
  </em>
  <span> about it all that much. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>He apologizes to his father, once the yelling is over, because he can talk when he’s in the gray place, he just doesn’t feel as much as he usually does. And then he goes into his room and lays on his bed until he kind of. Falls back into his body. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>It’s a useful thing to be able to do. Because Tim doesn’t get yelled at </span>
  <em>
    <span>a lot</span>
  </em>
  <span> but he does get yelled at </span>
  <em>
    <span>enough</span>
  </em>
  <span>, and also he sometimes uses it on very long afternoons and evenings when he is alone, because it makes the time go faster. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>It never really occurs to him that this is something that not everyone can do. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>This will end up being a recurring theme in his life. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Being able to float away like that remains useful as his life takes a turn for the extraordinary — it’s good for being Robin, because sometimes he gets captured and the asshole will start saying awful things or hitting him and he can just zone away to the gray place. And sometimes Bruce yells, too, and Tim has never gotten any better at being yelled at. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>It all works out. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>It can be useful for other things too, Tim learns. Like sex. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Sex is a strange, clunky object in Tim’s life. It’s a bit like a badly-placed end table, which he keeps stubbing his toe on. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Tim always thought of it as one of those romanticized obligations— like prom, or graduating high school. Things movies say are important, but are actually fairly boring. Everyone does it, pretty much, but only because it’s expected. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>This, as it turns out, is another one of those things he never considered something that not everybody else felt.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>But Tim dates people, because he’s expected to date people, and also he likes eating dinner with people and holding hands and stuff, but that means that people expect to have sex with him. And that’s fine. Tim likes nothing more than meeting people’s expectations. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>The great thing about it is that, if someone wants to have sex with you, they’re usually pretty content to just, well. </span>
  <em>
    <span>Have sex with you,</span>
  </em>
  <span> and Tim is free to float into his gray place until they’re done. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>The physical reactions on his end tend to take care of themselves. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>And that would all be fine, there would never be any problem with that, maybe Tim could just get through his life letting people just. Have sex with him. Except— </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Well. Except Kon. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Kon, who is so bizarrely insistent that Tim be as into any sex-things they did as Kon is. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Which has led to this situation, with Tim laying on the bed and staring at the ceiling, and Kon sitting on the edge of it with his head in his hands. Neither one of them is wearing clothes. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Tim,” Kon says, voice breaking, “Tim, you can’t </span>
  <em>
    <span>do that</span>
  </em>
  <span> to me.” </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>They’d had a conversation early in their relationship, at Kon’s insistence, about sex. About the vast span between their sex drives, because Kon is one of those people who likes sex. He likes sex a lot. And he's Tim's best friend, so he knows Tim doesn't. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>It’s the closest Tim’s ever gotten, to putting his Sex Thing into words. And Kon said they’d go at his pace, Kon said there was no pressure, but there was always pressure to have sex. People said there wasn’t, but there was. Not having sex with your partner ruined relationships. So Tim usually just let people have sex with him.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Do what?” Tim asks, and he hears his voice from far away. He is still coming back from the gray place. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <em>
    <span>“Leave,”</span>
  </em>
  <span> says Kon, muffled by his hands. “Do that weird zone-out thing you do, where your eyes go all dead—” </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Tim hadn’t known his eyes went all dead. No one’s ever told him that, before. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“But,” Tim says. He blinks his eyes and begins to feel more present. “You wanted to have sex.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Did you </span>
  <em>
    <span>not want to have sex?”</span>
  </em>
  <span> Kon asks, his voice taking on a panicked pitch. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>There are many ways Tim could answer that; </span>
  <em>
    <span>‘No, I never want to have sex.’ ‘Yes, but only to make you happy.’</span>
  </em>
  <span> Instead of saying any of that, he lets the silence hang. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Tim, babe, I—” Kon rubs his hands over his face. “I want to have sex with </span>
  <em>
    <span>you,</span>
  </em>
  <span> do you understand that? You, and your snark, and your expressions, and your— </span>
  <em>
    <span>you-ness.</span>
  </em>
  <span> I can’t have sex with you when you’re dead-eyed like Batman just finished telling you off and limp like you’re— </span>
  <em>
    <span>drugged</span>
  </em>
  <span> or something, Jesus Christ.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>And Tim— Tim feels a strange twist of </span>
  <em>
    <span>anger</span>
  </em>
  <span> at that, which surprises him. Tim doesn’t really do angry, not the way all of his brothers do. Tim usually gets sad. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>But he’s. He’s trying </span>
  <em>
    <span>so hard,</span>
  </em>
  <span> okay, why isn’t that </span>
  <em>
    <span>enough?</span>
  </em>
  <span> He’s lying here and he was going to let his boyfriend fuck him, okay, he was going to let it happen just like he’s expected to, can’t he just float away to his gray place in peace? That’s all anyone wants out of sex, something warm and soft and an orgasm. Tim’ll be that for Kon, he doesn’t care. But he should be allowed to </span>
  <em>
    <span>float away</span>
  </em>
  <span>, and be somewhere else. Tim is giving him his body, why does where his mind is when it happens matter? Tim is giving him his body, why isn’t it </span>
  <em>
    <span>enough?</span>
  </em>
  
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Why is Tim never </span>
  <em>
    <span>enough?</span>
  </em>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>He can’t stand to look at the ceiling anymore, so he shuts his eyes. He can’t think of a way to say any of that to Kon, at least not in a way that can be understood. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Tim hears Kon sigh. Feels the bed dip as a warm, broad body lays next to him. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“We need to talk about this, Tim,” he says, and Tim knows he’s not just talking about the gray place in relation to sex. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Tim squeezes his already-closed eyes tighter. He lingers on the starbursts behind his eyelids. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>He nods. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Kon tangles their fingers together under the sheets, and doesn’t touch him anywhere other than that. Tim stays present. </span>
</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>This is a hot mess.</p></blockquote></div></div>
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